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It was on the lands of the lord of Senghenydd that Gilbert de Clare, Earl of Gloucester, built Castell Coch and Caerphilly. Caerphilly is described by the latest historian of the Art of War as the grandest specimen of its class; it represents the high-water mark of mediæval military architecture in this country, and was the model of Edward I.'s great castles in the north.
About nine miles north of Cardiff is Caerphilly Castle, which has the most remarkable leaning tower in Britain, it being more inclined from the perpendicular than any other that is known. It is about eighty feet high, and leans over a distance of eleven feet. It rests only on a part of its southern side, and maintains its position chiefly through the strength of the cement.
It was then in the hands of the king, pending the division of the Gloucester inheritance among the three co-heiresses. In 1318 Caerphilly, with the rest of Glamorgan, was granted to the younger Despenser, who perhaps enlarged the hall and made the other alterations referred to above.
The little towns of Montdragon and Mornas, which we passed this morning, are each situated under heights of this description. The castle of the former, of which a plate is given in Mr. Cooke's work, I think even superior to that of Caerphilly, in South Wales, in the "awsome eyriness," as a Scotsman would express it, with which its detached masses are grouped.
Morgan was a sturdy, thick-set old man of the ancient stock; a stiff churchman, who breakfasted regularly on fat broth and Caerphilly cheese in the fashion of his ancestors; hot, spiced elder wine was for winter nights, and gin for festal seasons.
And now the Earl of Gloucester employed his resources in strengthening his Glamorgan lordship to resist the threatened invasion of Llywelyn by building Castell Coch and Caerphilly. Llywelyn continued his victorious career as long as war lasted. In 1266 he inflicted a crushing defeat on Mortimer at Brecon.
Caerphilly Castle consists of three lines of defences, and the way in which these supplement each other shows that the work in all essentials was designed as a great whole; it did not grow up bit by bit.
The Earl of Gloucester found it necessary to build Caerphilly Castle to uphold his influence in Glamorgan. But it was just the expansion of Llywelyn's power which forced Edward I. to overthrow him once for all.
By the strength and position of Caerphilly, one may measure the power of Llywelyn ap Gruffydd after the Barons' War and before the accession of Edward I. The Prince of Wales had extended his sway down as far as Brecon, and Welshmen everywhere were looking to him as the restorer of their country's independence.
Within its walls Edward II. took refuge when he escaped from Caerphilly, for it had the privilege of sanctuary; but after leaving Neath a faithless monk betrayed him, and he was put to death most cruelly at Berkeley Castle. Only a ruined gateway remains of Neath Castle, blackened by the smoke of smelting-works.
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